Kumkis bring relief to Urangattiri residents after elephant episode

Forest authorities use trained elephants to rescue a tusker from a well, sparking protests and compensation offers from the government.

Forest and wildlife authorities began patrolling the forest fringes with two trained kumki elephants at Koorankallu near Odakkayam in Urangattiri panchayat, where an elephant had fallen into a well in a private plantation on Thursday, triggering a chain of protests and resistance by local residents.

People in the village celebrated the arrival of the two kumkis from Wayanad on Friday afternoon as it was one of the three preconditions set by protesters for the rescue of the hapless tusker that fell into the well. The tusker, presumably a 16-year-old juvenile, was rescued on Thursday by breaking open the well’s sidewall.

Divisional Forest Officer (Nilambur North) P. Karthik said the tusker had suffered only minor injuries as it fell into the well. “I don’t think it will come back to trouble farmers. But we are monitoring the forest borders,” he said.

The government on Friday morning offered a compensation of ₹1.5 lakh to Sunny Koorankallu, the owner of the well into which the elephant fell. The compensation was another precondition for ending Thursday’s protests by residents.

“The third offer given to the people is electric fencing for around 7 km, which the Forest department is going to erect soon. We have addressed the issue entirely by taking the people into confidence,” said Edavanna range forest officer P. Salim. The incident happened within the Kodumpuzha forest station limits of Edavanna range.

Forest officials said they would monitor the movement of the rescued elephant. Kumkis will be used for patrol for a few days. However, there was pressure on the Forest authorities to bring kumkis back to Wayanad, where protests raged on Friday following the death of a woman in a tiger attack.

The two kumkis brought to Urangattiri were Vikram and Konni Surendran, the best with the Forest department, and their services were much in demand in Wayanad in the wake of the increasing human-wildlife conflict there.